14 Month Update

Well, we are very behind on posting, but I guess that is what happens when you hit the toddler stage. Virginia is keeping us too busy! She is moving with lightening fast speed now - she's fully mastered walking and is almost running at this point. There is no slowing her down. She won't let us hold her even for a minute.

Her language is starting to pick up a bit, but since she's been so focused on mobility, she hasn't had time to practice speaking that much. I've always heard that kids are either walkers or talkers, and she's definitely a walker so I guess we'll have to wait for the talker to show up. It is funny though because it is usually the boys who walk first while the girls do the talking. But I've said from very early on that we got a little boy's personality in a little girl's body and I think I was right. Virginia is bringing new meaning to the word hyperactive - like father, like daughter!

But Virginia is talking a bit and we are enjoying watching her speech develop. As of late June, Virginia was saying the following words: uh oh (first word), mama, numnum (like yum yum - she uses it to mean food), hi, bye, book ("buh"), and this ("dis"). She's also saying dada sometimes, but we aren't sure whether to call it a real word yet since she also refers to Thomas as mama. She signs "more," "eat," and brushing her teeth (she developed this sign on her own). Her receptive language is clearly quite good, because she follows directions well. I will hand her a baby doll and tell her to put the baby in the carseat - she'll walk across the room, place the baby in the seat and start rocking the seat back and forth. She also is becoming quite skilled at point out different animals in books and distinguishing between them. The kittens in Goodnight Moon are her favorite. She has no interest in the book - she just wants to turn the page so she can point out the kittens on the next page.

Things Virginia does and enjoys at 14 months:

• Virginia adores dogs and cats. Whenever we visit the Harvey home, she chases poor Phoebe the dog around the kitchen island and squeals with delight. When we are out on walks in her stroller, she spots dogs two blocks away and points emphatically at them.



• Virginia has suddenly become obsessed with shoes. She brings them to us, sits down and motions for us to put them on her feet.



• For the past several weeks, Virginia has started giving kisses. So sweet. One of my favorite times was playing with her and Thomas in bed one morning... she started going back and forth giving me a kiss and then Thomas a kiss several times.



• Virginia made the switch to one nap. The past few weeks, she had been fighting the afternoon nap because she was taking such a good long morning nap, so we just pushed the long nap back to after lunch. She still gets a little tired at the usual morning nap time, but the transition seems to be going well. And she often sleeps a full three hours in the afternoon now, so that is a nice break! The schedule just works so much better because we can do real outings now and also attend a lot of the toddler events which are scheduled for mid-mornings.


• Virginia is a dancing machine! She loves moving to music. She shakes her little bottom, waves her arms, shakes her head back and forth, and has started swaying side to side too.


• Virginia's favorite songs: Five Little Monkeys Jumping on the Bed (she does all the hand motions), One Two Buckle My Shoe, Twinkle Twinkle Little Star, Friends in Low Places (she's an honorary Southern girl - she seems to love country music), and The Little Green Frog song.